Revelation of the Magi: The Lost Tale of the Wise Men's Journey to Bethlehem Read online

  Another important reason for this text’s neglect, however, is that it belongs to two categories of material that historically have been scorned in the study of early Christianity. First, it is an apocryphal writing, and scholars have long privileged the canonical writings of the New Testament to the exclusion of writings outside of the canon. There are, of course, a few exceptions, such as the writings just mentioned, but beyond these, most apocryphal writings remain sorely neglected.

  Second, the Revelation of the Magi is one of a handful of canonical and apocryphal texts that focus on eventssurrounding the birth of Jesus. Although the Christmas story has fascinated believers throughout the centuries, there are only two accounts of Jesus’s birth among the four canonical Gospels, suggesting that the birth of Jesus was not nearly as important for the first Christians as the death, Resurrection, and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. Furthermore, Matthew and Luke tell markedly different stories about Jesus’s birth, and the differences cannot be easily harmonized.7 As a result, the great majority of scholars today believe that this material has very little claim to historicity and have therefore ignored it. The study of the historical Jesus has mostly focused on his sayings and his final days in Jerusalem; only a few recent scholars have found any reliable historical details in the infancy narratives—and the story of the Magi is not one of them.8

  Even if it is poorly known today, the manuscript that contains the Revelation of the Magi was never truly lost—certainly not in the way that, say, the Dead Sea Scrolls were. After the existing manuscript was copied down at the Zuqnin monastery in southeastern Turkey by an anonymous monk at the end of the eighth century, it changed hands at some point and was kept in a monastery in the Egyptian desert. There it stayed until the eighteenth century, when G. S. Assemani, collecting manuscripts on behalf of the Vatican Library, brought it to Rome, where it resides today.

  Though this manuscript had been known by European scholars for several hundred years, it was not until rather recently that scholars first began to look closely at the legend of the Magi that it contained. An Italian translation of the Revelation of the Magi was made in the 1950s, and a few scholars in the decades since have discussed the text in journal articles, often peripherally. Quite serendipitously, when I first learned of the existence of the Revelation of the Magi, I had just finished my first year of studying the Syriac language. I was therefore well prepared to begin translating the text with the help of J. F. Coakley, Professor of Syriac at Harvard.

  After nearly a year of biweekly meetings with Professor Coakley to check my work, I had managed to produce a rough but complete translation of the Revelation of the Magi. Despite the many hours of work that this had required, my task as a scholar of early Christian writings was only beginning. Unlike a scholar working on a New Testament text or even a well-known apocryphal writing, there was virtually no preexisting “conversation” about the Revelation of the Magi into which I was entering. Very few scholars knew that the text existed at all, so there were only some tentative suggestions about how old the Revelation of the Magi might be, who might have written it, and where it was composed.9

  To figure out the most likely date of composition, my first step was to start with the latest possible time the text could have been written and then work backward as far as possible. As mentioned earlier, there is only one copy of the Revelation of the Magi in existence, and that manuscript is securely dated to the late eighth century. Is it possible that the anonymous scribe who wrote this manuscript was actually the author of the Revelation of the Magi? Not likely, for several reasons. First, as a general matter, scholars of early Christianity know that the date of a manuscript is very rarely the date of the text it contains.10 Second, the manuscript itself—known as the Chronicle of Zuqnin, for the monastery in which it was written—contains a number of writings that are known to have existed much earlier than the eighth century. Third, a Christian writer named Theodore bar Konai, who lived on the Arabian Peninsula at almost the same time that the chronicle was written, seems to have known about the Revelation of the Magi.11 There is no reason to suspect that the Chronicle of Zuqnin would have traveled from southeastern Turkey to the Arabian Desert in the span of only a few years. It seems far more likely that the Revelation of the Magi was written—and circulated rather widely—earlier than the eighth century.

  But how much earlier? Fortunately, even though we possess only one full copy of the Revelation of the Magi, there is another very important witness to this text. This other witness is a Latin commentary on the Gospel of Matthew, usually thought to have been written in thefifth century and known by scholars as the Opus Imperfectum in Matthaeum. The anonymous writer of this commentary, when he comes to Matthew’s story of the Magi, relates a legend about these mysterious figures. Even though he summarizes this legend in only a few short paragraphs, it is clearly the same story as that found in the Revelation of the Magi.12 Moreover, it is very likely that he had actually seen a written copy of the Revelation of the Magi, since there are several parts of his summary that agree, practically verbatim, with the copy of the Revelation of the Magi that has survived for us.13

  So it seems certain that a version of the Revelation of the Magi existed when the Opus Imperfectum was written in the fifth century. But how do we know that the Syriac text of the Revelation of the Magi that we have was written earlier than the fifth century? After all, it could be a later form of the legend that had been expanded significantly. There is one small, seemingly insignificant detail in the Syriac text that tells us when it was written. In the Syriac language, nouns can be either masculine or feminine, and in the Revelation of the Magi, “the Holy Spirit” is a feminine noun. Although it might surprise us today to think of the Holy Spirit as a female entity, this is exactly what Syriac writers of the second, third, and fourth centuries considered it/her. Starting in the fifth century, however, Syriac writersbegan to treat “the Holy Spirit” as a masculine noun, under influence from Greek Christian thought. What this means, therefore, is that the Syriac language itself confirms that the form of the Revelation of the Magi that we possess must have been written earlier than the fifth century.

  But this quirk of the Syriac language tells us only that the text must have been written earlier than the fifth century. To determine how much earlier it was written, we need to look for other clues in the Syriac form of the Revelation of the Magi. Recall that in the summary of the Revelation of the Magi presented earlier, I suggested that the story of the Apostle Thomas’s conversion of the Magi was probably not originally part of the Revelation of the Magi. Not only does it seem superfluous from a narrative point of view, but it also has a number of literary features that do not fit very well with what has come before. First, the Thomas episode is narrated in the third person, whereas the rest of the Revelation of the Magi is narrated by the Magi themselves, in the first person. Although such shifts in the perspective of the narrator are not unheard of in ancient Christian writings, this shift is especially abrupt and unexplained within the narrative. Second, the Thomas episode contains a striking change in terminology as compared with the first-person section of the Revelation of the Magi. One of the most distinctive features of the first-person section is its complete avoidance of the proper name “Jesus Christ” to refer to the divine being whom the Magi encounter. Yet as careful as the author is to forgo this name and other obviously Christian terminology, the Thomas section is not at all concerned to avoid the name “Jesus Christ,” using it almost twenty times!

  Because of these reasons, I believe that the Thomas episode was a later addition to the Revelation of the Magi. I will say more shortly about the reasons that someone might have wanted to tamper with a text that purported to be the authentic testimony of the Magi about the coming of Christ. But for now, let us use the Thomas episode to help find out more about when the Revelation of the Magi was written—or at least when it was tampered with. As it happens, stories about the Apostle Thomas were especially popular among ancient Christian
s living in Syria. The most famous collection of these stories is known as the Apocryphal Acts of the Apostle Thomas, and it includes accounts of his miracles, his preaching, and his eventual martyrdom in India. Even though the Acts of Thomas and the Thomas episode from the Revelation of the Magi do not tell the same story, they share numerous connections in their language and theology.14 These similarities suggest that the Thomas episode was probably composed and added to the Revelation of the Magi around the same time and place as other Thomas legends were being written down—that is, around thelate third or early fourth century in Syria. Therefore, the first-person form of the Revelation of the Magi must have been composed by this time at the latest,15 and perhaps earlier if it came from someplace outside of Syria.

  But how much earlier might the original form of the Revelation of the Magi have been written? Might it be, as it claims, the authentic testimony of the Magi themselves? As tantalizing a possibility as this might be, it is highly unlikely. First of all, there is the basic problem of historicity with the whole Magi story found in Matthew’s Gospel. As mentioned earlier, scholars have by and large concluded that there is virtually nothing of historical value in the infancy narratives of the New Testament. This judgment has been applied with particular vigor to the Magi story.16 Even the Star of Bethlehem, the most impressive feature of the story, has never been incontrovertibly identified, arguments to the contrary notwithstanding.17 And the fact that no trace of the Magi story is found in Luke’s infancy narrative, which has the humble shepherds as the first outside witnesses to the child Jesus, or in any other of the earliest Christian writings does not enhance its credibility.

  But even if we were to grant that Matthew’s story of the Magi was based on an actual historical event, the Revelation of the Magi would not be a very strong candidate to have been written by the Magi themselves. True, the author of the Revelation of the Magi has carefullycrafted this story and added levels of detail such that one might believe it to be the work of the Magi themselves. Once we closely inspect the story, however, it becomes clear that the author has used written sources—such as the letters of the Apostle Paul, the Gospel of John, and the Book of Revelation, to name a few—that were written years after the “historical Magi” almost certainly would have died.18

  In fact, the author not only used many of the earliest Christian writings in the New Testament. He seems to have used a rather obscure apocryphal Infancy Gospel that was likely written in the mid- to late-second century, a Gospel so obscure that it lacks an agreed-upon name!19 For the sake of (some) clarity, let us call it Infancy Gospel X.20 In Infancy Gospel X, the Magi come to visit the child Jesus at a small house outside the village of Bethlehem. Joseph—the main actor in Infancy Gospel X, as opposed to the narratives in Matthew and Luke, where he never says a word—proceeds to question these strange visitors about how they knew of the child’s birth.

  During the ensuing dialogue with Joseph, the Magi mention a number of details corroborated by the Revelation of the Magi. These include learning of the star’s coming through their own very ancient writings, the Magi’s lack of fatigue after a lengthy journey, and the indescribably bright star being visible to the Magi alone. Joseph even presumes the Magi to be astrologers because they keep looking up at the sky, apparently watching their invisible celestial guide. A very similar scene takes place in the Revelation of the Magi, but there it is the leaders in Jerusalem, not Joseph, who cannot see the star. Finally, Infancy Gospel X envisions the Magi not as three in number, but as a much larger group—an interpretation hinted at in the Revelation of the Magi (see The Adoration of the Magi on page 27).21

  These parallels are very striking, but in Infancy Gospel X all these details are tightly concentrated in the Magi’s brief appearance at the Bethlehem cave, not spread throughout the narrative as in the Revelation of the Magi. It seems quite probable that there is some sort of literary relationship between these two works, but who has borrowed from whom? It is very difficult to tell, and it is even possible that the authors of these two works used a third source (whether oral or written) independently of each other. I myself have gone back and forth many times about which writing was older. More research on Infancy Gospel X would be necessary before a decisive judgment could be made.

  Even so, if we assume that the Revelation of the Magi came into being sometime after Infancy Gospel X, then it was probably written in the late second or early third century. It was then “corrected” in the late third or early fourth century by adding the concluding narrative about the Apostle Thomas’s visit to the Magi.

  If the Revelation of the Magi was not, as it claims, written by the Magi themselves, then who might have written this strange story? Although it is possible to give, with a reasonable degree of confidence, a window of time during which it was composed, we have almost nothing to go on regarding the author’s identity or location. Only a small number of early Christian writings are written by the person put forth as the author anyway, so the Revelation of the Magi is not much different from them in this respect.22 The place of authorship is similarly unknowable: presumably the author’s sophisticated theology—which we will address momentarily—suggests an urban location, perhaps Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, Ephesus, or another major urban center of the Roman world. All we know is that the Revelation of the Magi was known in Constantinople (where the author of the Opus Imperfectum found it) in the fifth century, and in southeastern Turkey (where an anonymous monk at the Zuqnin monastery copied it) and the Arabian Peninsula (where Theodore bar Konai lived) by the end of the eighth century.

  Yet even if we cannot say much of anything substantial about the identity of the author or his whereabouts, we can actually say quite a bit about his understanding of the Christian message, and about why his understanding might have been viewed as theologically dangerous enough to warrant a new ending for the Revelation of the Magi.23

  Benozzo Gozzoli (1420–1497) The Adoration of the Magi (with Gozzoli’s self-portrait—with red cap). Lorenzo il Magnifico as the youngest of the three Magi. Fresco, 1459. Palazzo Medici Riccardi, Florence, Italy. Photo Credit : Erich Lessing/Art Resource, NY

  The Adoration of the Magi, by Benozzo Gozzoli, 1459, Florence, Italy. Gozzoli has not depicted the familiar three Magi traveling alone, but instead accompanied by a great cavalcade. Both Infancy Gospel X and an early form of the Revelation of the Magi likewise believed that the Magi constituted a large group.

  WHY WAS THE

  “REVELATION OF THE MAGI” WRITTEN?

  As mentioned earlier, one of the most noticeable features of the Revelation of the Magi is its careful avoidance of the name “Jesus Christ” to designate the Magi’s celestial guide. This consistent omission is one of the reasons that the Apostle Thomas episode’s free use of the name seems so jarring. Why has the author refused to use the name “Jesus Christ?” If the Magi in the first-person narrative come to the end of the story without ever using the name, this implies that they have had an experience of Christ without ever knowing this savior figure as Christ. The case of the Magi, then, raises the possibility that Christ has appeared to many people and yet not revealed himself as Jesus Christ.

  The idea of Christ remaining unidentified in manifestations to the peoples of the world is, in fact, affirmed by statements that the celestial Christ makes to the Magi. He tells them that he has appeared not only to them in a manner congruent with their religion. Indeed, this is only one of many instances of Christ’s revelation to humanity, since he has been sent “to fulfill everything that was spoken about me in the entire world and in every land” (13:10). Having heard this revelation from Christ, the Magi themselves then affirm it before others. To the inhabitants of Jerusalem, they explainthat they have come to worship Christ “because he has worshipers in every land” (17:5). Even to the child’s mother, Mary, they insist on the universality and omnipresence of the Christ event: “[T]he forms with him are seen in every land, because he has been sent by his majesty for the salvation and redemption of e
very human being” (23:4).

  According to the author of the Revelation of the Magi, the fundamental Christian message is not simply that Christ has been sent in order to save all humanity. That is a common enough belief among early Christians that its presence in this text would be unremarkable. The Revelation of the Magi goes much further than this, claiming that the revelation of Christ is actually the foundation of all humanity’s religious beliefs and practices. What the Magi have experienced in the fulfillment of their age-old prophecy, while obviously of great significance for them, is but “one drop of salvation from the house of majesty” (15:1)—one limited instance of Christ’s salvific activity in the world.

  What are the practical consequences of this belief that all forms of religious experience are revelations of Christ? Two especially come to mind. First, this belief means that the Revelation of the Magi has a far more positive view of non-Christian religious traditions than any other early Christian writing. There were a handful of early Christian thinkers who held that glimpses of Christ were had in the past by the greatest of the pagan philosophers—Socrates, to name one example. But these thinkers also maintained that such glimpses were woefully incomplete when compared with the definitive revelation of Christ in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. And such an opinion, it must be remembered, is quite charitable when compared with most early Christian beliefs about non-Christian religions. The vast majority of early Christians, like their Israelite forebears, tended to regard the gods of other peoples as illusory at best, demonic at worst.